# Image alt audit

_Source: https://seomatrix.ai/tools/alt-audit/_

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## What it does

Alt text is the written description assigned to an image through the HTML alt attribute; this checker scans every image on a page you enter and flags the ones that are missing it, left it empty, ran it too long, or reused the raw filename. Screen readers, Google Images, and AI answer engines all rely on that text to understand a picture they cannot see, so when it is absent or junk the image becomes invisible to them and the page loses accessibility, image-search traffic, and the context that helps a model cite you.

## What it checks

- **Missing alt attribute** — An <img> with no alt at all, which makes screen readers announce the filename or nothing and leaves the image meaningless to search crawlers and AI models.
- **Empty alt (alt="")** — A blank alt marks an image as purely decorative and hides it from assistive tech, which is correct for spacers and background flourishes but wrong for a content image that actually informs the reader.
- **Filename-as-alt** — Alt text like IMG_2043.jpg or hero-final-v2 is the file's name rather than a description, so it passes a naive has-alt test while telling a human, crawler, or model nothing.
- **Overly long alt** — Alt text that runs to a full paragraph is tiring to hear read aloud and dilutes the keywords, whereas a concise description of roughly under 125 characters reads and indexes better.
- **Coverage across the page** — The share of images on the URL that carry usable alt text, since a single missing description can break the accessibility of an otherwise clean page.
- **Descriptive specificity** — Whether the alt names what is actually shown, such as bar chart of 2025 SEO budgets, versus a generic label like image or photo, because specific alt feeds image search and gives an LLM real context.

## How to use it

1. Paste your page URL into the checker and run the scan.
2. Review the flagged images grouped by issue: missing, empty, filename-as-alt, and over-long.
3. Fix the alt in your CMS or template with a short, specific description of each content image, then re-run to confirm zero flags.

## FAQ

### What is alt text and why does it matter?

Alt text is a short written description of an image stored in the HTML alt attribute. It lets screen readers voice the image, lets Google Images index it, and gives AI answer engines the context they need to understand and cite the page.

### Should every image have alt text?

Every image that conveys information needs a descriptive alt, while purely decorative images like spacers and background flourishes should carry an empty alt="" so assistive tech skips them. The right answer is always a real description or a deliberate blank, never a missing attribute.

### Why is using the filename as alt text a problem?

A filename like IMG_2043.jpg technically fills the alt attribute but describes nothing, so it passes a shallow check while still leaving the image meaningless to screen readers, image search, and AI models.

### How long should alt text be?

Aim for a concise, specific phrase of roughly under 125 characters, because a short, focused description is easier to listen to and an overloaded alt dilutes both readability and the keywords that help image search.